If I Did That Over There, They'd Cut My Hands Off

San Diego Reader ^ | May 14, 2008 | Bill Manson

[Defiant]

What’s it like, being Muslim in San Diego?

The question arose for me earlier this year when I decided to hit Ocean Beach on maybe the worst night of the winter. It was Wednesday, the end of market day. Rainstorms exploding in off the Pacific, marquees flapping, most market folks packing up, re-boxing their fruit. But not the guys in the black tent near where Bacon crosses Newport. From inside the gust-wrenched canvas, half a dozen men shouted to scurrying passersby to come on in for the ultimate hand-warmer. Guled and Mohammed and Abdi and Hamza and a bunch of other young Somali men were selling the thing I’d weathered the storm to find: samosas, the Middle East and India’s great snack gift to the world. Aah, yes. Down in three gulps. A beef, a vegetarian, and a Californian adaptation (cream cheese and pineapple), all enclosed in hot, golden, flaky pastry.

We got to talking. These laughing guys were all students. All Muslim. All living a double life. Studying by night, selling samosas by day at the various farmers’ markets around town, including here and at UCSD. I’d always known the Somalis were an outgoing group. Somalia embraces the longest seaboard in Africa. They’re coastal people who have survived strangers with different cultures landing on their shores for millennia.

[mamelukesabre]

What do you eat with? YOur feet?

[Grizzled Bear]

And why EVERY single armed conflict in the world today has muslims on one side and seculars/Christians/jews/other muslims on the other?

Genesis 16:

7 The angel of the LORD found Hagar near a spring in the desert; it was the spring that is beside the road to Shur. 8 And he said, "Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from, and where are you going?" "I'm running away from my mistress Sarai," she answered.

9 Then the angel of the LORD told her, "Go back to your mistress and submit to her."

10 The angel added, "I will so increase your descendants that they will be too numerous to count."

11 The angel of the LORD also said to her: "You are now with child and you will have a son. You shall name him Ishmael, for the LORD has heard of your misery.

12 He will be a wild donkey of a man; his hand will be against everyone and everyone's hand against him, and he will live in hostility toward all his brothers."

[wastedyears]

Palmer Method Certificate?

[piytar]

That was meant as a retorical question, but you gave one very good answer!

[FormerLib]

What do you eat with? YOur feet?

Welcome to Western Civilization!

[mamelukesabre]

Very funny.

Do you eat:

tacos
burritos
hoagies
hamburgers
onion rings
cheeseburgers
potato chips
corn chips
gyros
pizza
grilled cheese
ruebens
tuna salad sandwiches

If so, do you use those shiny metal utinsils in pictured in your post? Or do you just use your hands?

[mountainbunny]

That is hardly a Muslim thing. Cultures throughout history have seen left-handedness as distinctly evil.
The word “sinister” means left-handed.
See: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/sinister

[I still care]

Very sweet, but it’s at best wallpapering over a religion that draws much of it’s identity from rules.

Superobvious even in this puff piece on how important it is to adhere to rules that separate you out.

[Ajnin]

But you don’t always have to assimilate to the new place you come to. You can keep your culture.

The most telling quote of the entire article.

[forkinsocket]

LOL!

Hell yeah I eat with my fingers & drink the soup from a bowl. & when we’re in love, a couple will feed each other, putting the food in each other’s mouths. *Mizrahi pride* :D

[wastedyears]

I’m not sinister

Wow, I would have been persecuted had I lived a few hundred years ago.

[absalom01]

This writer is just practicing to be a good dhimmi .... don’t be so harsh...

[mountainbunny]

I’m sure you aren’t bad at all :)

But you possibly would have been treated as such just a few hundred years ago.

I have left-handed family members whom I love and adore. Odd to think that they would be seen as “bad” in another time.

[bboop]

I’m sorry - eat with your right hand, wipe with your left. Some civilization.

[SoCalPol]

There are several Muslim Mosques in San Diego County which has a pop. of over 3 million.
There are also over 30,000 Iraqis here.

The terrorists that flew into the Pentagon on 9/11 were living in San Diego over a year.

[bboop]

Hahaha, thanks for elaborating on the eating customs of the sand-pounders.

[Chickensoup]

Friends of mine with lots of Africa experience tell me that continent-wide, Somalis are despised for being lying, cheating, stealing, entitled, groups. And that is saying a lot for Africa.

[Chickensoup]

Friends of mine with lots of Africa experience tell me that continent-wide, Somalis are despised for being lying, cheating, stealing, entitled, groups. And that is saying a lot for Africa.

[cyberella]

http://www.frugalsites.net/911/attack/

[Defiant]

I think the concern with the left hand being unclean in Islam involves the fact that they have not had the concept of toilet paper until recently, if at all. Extra yuck factor attached to the left hand.